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Comment by thequux | Hacker News Reader

I think unions are great! I'm even a member of one, and have been known to encourage everybody else around me to unionize. Notably, though, I love in Belgium.

The American implementation of unions, on the other hand, is not great. While in the US, I've run into rules like not being allowed to plug something in because only union electricians are allowed to do that, and that's just one example among many. Police unions and teacher's unions are mostly known for making bad employees unfirable outside of egregious circumstances, and teacher's unions in particular don't seem to have improved pay or working conditions much.

I have no idea where the difference comes from, but for people who have only seen and interacted with the American system, I don't blame them for not liking unions

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The differences were made law with the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947.

I.e. sympathy strikes are illegal in the US, so the only real power left to unions is jealously guarding the petty pearls available to them.

>While in the US, I've run into rules like not being allowed to plug something in because only union electricians are allowed to do that, and that's just one example among many.

I obviously don't know anything about the particular union you're talking about. But rules like this are often written to close a loophole. For example, the union negotiates higher wages for their electricians. After the deal is signed, the company hires more office secretaries, reassigns to them most tasks that used to be done by electricians, and fires a bunch of electricians because there's "not enough work."

> teacher's unions in particular don't seem to have improved pay or working conditions much.

The difference in pay between unionized and nonunionized teachers is big enough that I wonder where you got such an idea.

Yep, they feel like different institutions sharing some similar objectives and the same name. In the US they had a very institutional, "role-based" org feel rather than being a work welfare and wellbeing observer I've experienced in most of Europe. I can only assume this is due to the more adversarial relationship between workers and employers?

The sad part is that unions have greatly increased pay, benefits, and improved working conditions for teachers. There is constant struggle between school administrations and teachers. Admins will fuck them over immediately if given the chance.

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